A Sylmar, CA Chevy dealership is among those price gouging on the new Volt. Dealers are marking up the Volt by $5,000-$10,000 on eBay auctions. Offline one Florida dealer is reportedly asking for an incredible $25K above the MSRP. (Source: eBay Motors)

A number Volts are selling at $5,000 or more markup -- one dealer is reportedly asking for $25k extra

General Motors'2011
Chevy Voltis the first EV from an American automaker to debut under $50,000
USD. Priced at $40,280 before $7,500 tax credit, demand for the EV is
very high. Despite increasing production in response to demand, GM will
likely only be able to ship 25,000 of the vehicles this year. While it
promisesmore
production next year, some "green-minded" customers can't wait to
get their hands on the vehicle.

One Michigan dealer listed a "Buy It
Now" Volt on eBay Motors for $46,923 USD -- a markup of $6,643 USD [1].
Another North Carolina dealer actually tried to resell a Volt it bought
from a Maryland dealer. That Volt was marked at a cool $49,900 USD -- a
markup of $9,620 USD [2].
Neither of these vehicles sold (note: links will expire in about a
month).

But these examples pale in comparison to a Florida
dealer's incredible asking price of $65,590 [source].
We'll save you the math -- that's a markup of $25,310 USD.

We've been following the Volt sinceits
days as a conceptand we absolutely give GM praise for following through and
delivering on its ambitious design. That said we're not sure who would
shell out an extra $25K for a Volt. If current auctions are any
indication, most people aren't interested in buying the vehicle at that high a
price. But if P.T. Barnum is to be believed, the dealer may eventually
find someone out there who would be willing to pay that much
for it.

Currently a third Volt auction ends Saturday on
eBay [3].
That Volt, located in California, is offered for $47,700 USD, a markup of
$7,420 USD.

GM will be building 60,000 or more Volts next
year, so if you don't want to pay a markup, you could always wait.

The company claims it isn't happy with the
markups. But Chevy Volt marketing director Tony DiSalle tellsWard's
Auto inan interview,
"there isn’t a mechanism to prevent that from happening."

Price markups are nothing new, but on EVs and
hybrids they're an especially sore spot as customers already are paying a
premium for the fuel-efficient technology.

The Chevy Volt's price markups are similar to
markups that some Toyota dealers were placing on Prius hybrid vehicles back in
2009, when the new third generation models first were shipping. While the
Prius markups were a bit subtler in that most Toyota dealers didn't blatantly
post them to eBay, they were occurring nationwide. We did a report on
this practice and caught
one dealer in the act. While the 2010 Prius was a much higher volume
vehicle, its similar respective demand per volume offers parallels to the Volt.

The Volt's key competitor is the 2011 Nissan LEAF
EV, which went on sale in early December. The Volt's key advantage is
that it has a backup fuel take, greatly extending the range. The 2011 Nissan
LEAF EV is optimistically rated to deliver 100 miles on a charge under good
conditions. Another disadvantages is that Nissan is only selling and
service LEAF EVs in a handful of "green" states -- California,
Washington, Oregon, Arizona, and Tennessee.

The LEAF's big advantage is that it is priced a
$32,780 USD before tax credits in the U.S. Nissan has been less specific
about its production plans, but it says it will fulfill all reservations placed
in 2010 by September. Given that itclaimed
20k reservationsand thatonly
4 in 10 of those who placed reservationsare
reportedly following through with a purchase, this would indicate -- with the
inclusion of conquest sales -- shipments of anywhere from 10,000-15,000 by the
end of the summer. This places Nissan's production slightly above GM's
current levels.

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I guess I can call my RC a EV too then. cuz oh yea it takes charge and can go up to 20 miles !

Its a god damn Hybrid, GM knows it, the government knows it. but of course since our country's ego is so f-king big we want to be #1 in everything, even we can't we have to be #2, no matter what kind of bullshit we can pull up, so yeah lets just call this a EV !

Nissan's Leaf, on the other hand, is a REAL EV.

That car looks ugly as shit and yeah its just an overpriced Cruze with as usual garbage GM component.

What the heck is wrong with you people! EVs are never going to have recharge times shorter than four hours in the near future! Here's the real deal, the EPA says the Leaf has a range of 73 miles, Nissan says the range varies from 47 to 138 miles. Once you're out of power, you're dead in the water. The Leaf requires 8 to 21 hours for a full recharge depending on what current you us, 110V or 240V. The Volt requires 4-8 hours. Meanwhile, for $8k more, you can have the Volt. The Volt also is all electric, but for an EPA estimated 35 miles, and GM claims 25 to 50 miles. It costs about $1.50 to recharge, significantly less than the Leaf, but will still take most people in the US to work and back. If that's not good enough, the Volt has a GENERATOR that keeps the batteries charged at around the 35% level so you're NEVER dead in the water. When the generator is running you get about 37 MPG. So, if you want to take your Volt on a 500 mile road trip, you can, and the MPGE (Equivalent, new EPA rating) would then be between 39.8 and 42.6. What do you get with the Leaf? Disappointed. This is a tech filled car that's being compared to luxury vehicles, Lexus, BMW, Mercedes Benz. It's quite as can be, even with the generator, because it's drag coefficient is incredibly low and they used tons of tech to keep it quite. It still has that 278lb/ft of torque for amazing take offs, and you can still go 100 MPH.

By the way, GM doubled their warranty in 2007 to 100k miles, since then their warranty claims are down 45%. Doubled their warranty (transferable) and claims have halved. If GMs components are garbage, why is it that the Volt warrantied it's battery pack for 8 year or 100k miles, and ONLY AFTER this did Nissan follow suit with their battery warranty. That's right folks, GM had more faith in their battery pack than Nissan did initially.

Bottom line for $8k more EVERYONE can use and enjoy the Volt, but only a select few will actually be able to replace their car with the Leaf. Basically people who will never need their car to go more than 50 miles away. Speaking of which, even if the range of the Leaf hits that 138 miles... who out there in their right mind is actually going to drive more than 50 miles away from home? Keeping in mind that once that battery dies, you're not going anywhere. NOBODY.

Last but not least, hybrid refers to the drivetrain! A hybrid drivetrain has a electric motor and ICE physically moving the car forward. The Volt is solely propelled by a motor, just like the Leaf, so calling it anything but an electric vehicle is asinine. Are you going to refer to the poor sap that starts carrying a generator around in his Leaf for emergencies as a hybrid car driver?!? No, idiot.

I think he didn't say anything "real" about your rant because all of the points had been made several times in the posts above.

1. The Volt is absolutely, positively not solely propelled by electric motors with a generator as backup power only. That was the original announcement for the car, but then GM developed a fancy planetary gear so the ICE could assist directly in propulsion. GM thinks this is a better solution. Maybe it is. But it's pointless to fight that it is generator + electric motor only like a locomotive, because it is not.

2. To argue that $8k more and more weight, etc, is great because this car is more useful than the Leaf is silly. It's the same argument people give for driving their kids to school in a Suburban... someday I might need to pick up three wash machines at Home Depot - how will I fit that in a regular car?! I might need the volume some day. Yes, a Leaf driver might need greater range some day, but that doesn't mean they should buy a Volt. Lots of families have two cars, if one can be a Leaf to commute in and the other used for long trips, doesn't that make more sense than the extra price of the Volt? Even having to occasionally rent a car... $8k can go a long way in car rentals. And this all gets amplified if the Leaf is more efficient on electric than the Volt is due to weight or less complexity.

The Leaf is a joke. I think Nissan has delivered like 25 cars since they introduced it (something that Dailytech has failed to report). The only reason that Nissan MAY be able to deliver all the cars that are on their waiting list this year is because so many people are RUNNING away from it...

Substance: The Volt is a plug-in parallel hybrid, nothing more. As such, it gets about 41 mpg based on electric range and gas range combined. Yawn.

It is not in the same class of vehicle as a Leaf. The Leaf is in the same class as the Tesla line, just less expensive.

The Volt is slightly more advanced than the current Prius technologically, but not as to fuel efficiency. When the plug-in Prius comes out next year, the Volt will still have longer battery-only range, but the Prius will have even higher MPG overall than its current 50 mpg. The Prius will also still cost much less. I think I said all this in the previous post.

quote: If GMs components are garbage, why is it that the Volt warrantied it's battery pack for 8 year or 100k miles, and ONLY AFTER this did Nissan follow suit with their battery warranty. That's right folks, GM had more faith in their battery pack than Nissan did initially.

Sadly this is not quite true. Since the Volt's ability to run additional miles after the battery is depleted means the state of the batteries affects the pollution the Volt will cause... the Volt and other Hybrids (yes the Volt is a Hybrid) are required by law to warranty the batteries for significantly longer time frames than a pure electric car (which with a dead battery still produces no pollution)

This is of course just one of the things that make a car like the Volt superior to using a full electric like the Leaf.

The thing that makes it superior in my mind, is that kWh for kWh of battery, the Volt is much better at reducing pollution. How? Well there are 24 kWh of battery in a Leaf (53 kWh in a Roadster) and 16 kWh in a Volt. That means for 2 Leafs, 3 Volts can be produced. For 1 Roadster, 3+ Volts can be produced. Since a Leaf/Roadster owner will need to use another car for long distance travel... and the Volt's battery can be recharged at the same rate as the Leaf/Roadster... the only times a Leaf or Roadster say gasoline over a Volt is when trip times between recharges is between 35-70 miles or 35-225 miles. Based on the 2001 survey... this is less than 10% of miles Americans drive.

If we think of an average driver using ~500 gallons of gasoline a year... the Volt will save over 400 gallons of that gas a year... a savings of 25 gallon per kWh. A Leaf might save 475 (25 being reserved for long distance travel)... but thats only 20 gallon per kWh saved.

Personally, if a really rich person wants to make a REAL green statement, they ought to take the 100,000 they might spend on a Roadster, buy a 50,000 Roadster and 3 Honda Insights that they give to people driving pre-2001 C- Segment Cars. Far more gasoline, pollution, etc would be saved from such a gesture at the same cost.